You Lucky People

05/05/2015 | General

People of a certain vintage might remember Tommy Trinder's famous catchphrase, 'You Lucky People.' It was a something that immediately came to mind watching the staff working at the Evanta Motor Company in Hertford.

Building unique handmade and bespoke cars based on classic British designs sounds like a dream job. In fact it is extremely hard to find any of the engineers working at the company that don’t have a big smile on their face.

Organised Toast

It is a truly unique company, where everything stops for organised toast breaks and joint lunch breaks where everyone chips in for the food. There is also a quirky even eccentric feel to Evanta which begins to dawn on you when you realise the reception is housed in a converted grain silo and the main workshop is guarded by two gold gnomes. The cars - usually styled on iconic 1950s Aston Martin designs - are not replicas but individually specified, modern equivalents, built to VOSA IVA standards.

Jaw-dropinGly beautiful

The range of jaw-dropingly beautiful Evanta GT, Evanta R1 and Barchetta cars however, have been brought to life with a little help from Pirtek Harlow. Ant Anstead, MD and founder of Evanta Motors has a lot to say about Perry Tubb, the Licensee at Pirtek Harlow.

"I started to build cars as a hobby and realised I was rather good at it. I had discovered a niche market and could turn it into a viable business. That was in 1995 and we have gone from strength to strength since then. I'm pleased to say we employ 12 people and have sites in Harlow and Coventry now. We are a recognised motor manufacturer with an ever-growing clientele. That success has been built on quality, so getting everything right is paramount. Using Pirtek is essential to Evanta. They are friendly, but business like, and they have created a great relationship between our companies. It is enjoyable working with them, with everyone on first name terms. A world class attitude, but with a family feel,” Anstead says. “Their products are flawless. We started using small components from them, but now Pirtek parts are essential in our production.

Modifications

However, where we find Pirtek come into their own is in the ability to alter, modify and manufacture parts for the company. We have used a lot of suppliers and the decision to use a company is not based on price, but quality, the availability of parts and the working relationship with that supplier. For instance we regularly fit General Motors LS3 V8 engines to the cars, which require modification for installation. Pirtek was not only able to modify the clutch pipes and supply the entire fuel system pipe work including the pump, but remade the fuel rail and regulator fittings.

Impossible deadlines

Perry will turn up with a tape measure and look at the problem we have presented him with, make copious notes and then go away to manufacture the part we require. We have never caught him out. We can present him with oil, fuel or brake hose requirements, in imperial or metric, or with odd threads, in fact anything oddball and he still finds it. Perry also works to the most impossible deadlines and when we did a restoration project for C4's ‘For the Love of Cars’, which I co-present, he was on site pandering to our every wish, simply to keep the filming deadlines on track. He works as if everything is an emergency so that we don't let a customer down. He has the patience of saint. We may be a small manufacturer, less than 20 cars a year, but 80 percent of those are exported, mostly to Europe, but they have gone as far as New Zealand and Beijing. At present we are working on a completely Evanta-designed car, our GT, which we will launch in 2016. Needless to say Pirtek will be heavily involved in that.”

“Pirtek are essential to our company”

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